Review: Craig Eriksson. Photos: David Harris
On Tuesday night at The Palais Theatre in Melbourne we experienced Kaleo on their 2025 Payback Tour and were completely captivated with the band’s versatility and musicality. As we entered the Palais, the excitement in the air was tangible.
Australian Singer/Songwriter/Producer Ben Swissa is a multi-instrumentalist who plays lead guitar, loops, bass and keys and was last night accompanied by a drummer. They warmed up the crowd perfectly, who seemed to appreciate their short but entertaining set.
Kaleo are a blues rock band from Mosfellsbaer in Iceland. Kaleo means ‘The Voice’ in Hawaiian and the lead singer certainly has an incredible one. Several of the band members were best friends through secondary school and they formed Kaleo back in 2012. Kaleo has gone on to have huge success worldwide and they are well known for their song Way Down We Go which gained critical acclaim, going double platinum and reached #1 on Billboard’s Alternative Songs chart. Their album A/B released in 2016 is an incredible album and is well worth a listen with its diverse mix of roadhouse blues, folk and stunning ballads.
Kaleo band:
Jokull ‘JJ’ Juliusson – Lead vocals / rhythm guitar
Rubin Pollock – Lead Guitar
Daniel Kristjansson – Bass / Keyboard
David Antonsson – Drums / Percussion / Backing vocals
Porleifer Gauker Davidsson – Harmonica / Slide Guitar / Mandolin / Guitar
The Kaleo band members came out on stage and started playing the intro to their dreamy atmospheric song USA TODAY. Lead singer ‘JJ’ then appears walking out fully dressed in white and looked like a cowboy. White boots, pants, shirt and a pink and white bomber jacket and cream hat. He looked incredible under a spotlight with the rest of the band dimmed in the background. The crowd erupted and got involved right from the get-go, clapping and singing along. It was an amazing, goosebumps -inducing vib.
The next song was BREAK MY BABY which featured fuzzy psychedelic guitar riffs reminiscent of The Black Keys. BROKEN BONES followed and the tempo completely changed into gritty blues, causing a crowd singalong. The soulful ballad I CAN’T GO ON WITHOUT YOU began with JJ whistling and then as he started singing revealed his amazing flexibility and versatility with his vocal range. ALL THE PRETTY GIRLS could have been Vance Joy or City and Colour singing as JJ sang in his falsetto register. We couldn’t believe the extent of JJ’s vocal range. One moment JJ would be belting out his deep, bass baritone vocals and the next he would be up in his falsetto register crooning.
Kaleo’s music is a diverse mix of blues rock, garage rock, indie rock, lo-fi and alt rock. Their sound is expansive and textured, full of light and shade, with a mix of blues, psychedelia and rock ‘n’ roll thrown in for good measure.
Meantime, the band’s effortless segues between soulful ballads and electrifying rock anthems showcased their versatility and musical virtuosity. Davidsson on harmonica owned the stage throughout numerous songs with his powerful harp solos. It’s also well worth mentioning that Antonsson is an incredible drummer, percussionist and backing vocalist. Throughout the show, he revealed his versatility, one minute playing thumping bass lines and rumbling beats, the next drumming with finesse using each element of the drumkit as sound effects to enhance the atmosphere of the songs. AUTOMOBILE is an acoustic folk song and brought the crowd back down for a short time. The chilled HEY GRINGO was next and with the catchy chorus:
“Who is smoking cigarettes? Who is smoking something else?”
For us fans, it was a rollercoaster ride through rock, soul and blues. You could feel the pressure building amongst the audience as the music began intensifying. It reached a climax during HOT BLOOD when the audience could no longer remain seated and leapt out of their chairs in a rush of adrenaline pumping their fists in the air, dancing, hollering and clapping along. At the end of this song, JJ walked off stage for a break and the band remained on stage and jammed together. The volcano had erupted and from then on, the concert lifted into high gear.
JJ came back on stage and performed LONELY COWBOY ,which is a mellow acoustic ballad. JJ then sang in his native Icelandic tongue the beautiful ballad VOR I’ VAGLASKOGI which was one of our favourite songs of the evening. It’s a haunting melody which touched our souls on a deep visceral level. SKINNY showcased how tight the band played together. Crowd favourite WAY DOWN WE GO almost blew the roof off the Palais as the crowd sang with gusto. Another incredible song NO GOOD finished the main set and the people gave up their seats during this song and ran down to the front of the stage to dance. Kaleo came back out for a 2-song encore playing two of their recent releases BACKDOOR and ROCK’N’ROLLER from their Mixed Emotions (2025) album which was a fitting finale to an epic and entertaining show.
My only criticism is that the show was too short. Kaleo played for 1 hour 15 minutes and then went off stage and then came back out for a 2-song encore, so the show only went for roughly 80-85 minutes. They were so incredibly good that the crowd most definitely wanted more. On a positive note, this band has a wow-factor that must be seen live.
SET LIST:
USA Today
Break My Baby
Broken Bones
I Can’t Go On Without You
All the Pretty Girls
Automobile
Hey Gringo
Hot Blood (extended outro with remainder of band on stage)
Lonely Cowboy
Vor i’ Vaglaskogi
Skinny
Way Down We Go
No Good (extended outro)
Encore:
Backdoor
Rock ‘n’ Roller
